Two Florida healthcare workers stand accused of abusing a senior citizen in their care and live streaming it so friends could watch online.
The clip reportedly shows the two women allegedly verbally abusing and taunting the patient, who is a woman suffering from dementia, Fox 35 reported Saturday.
When speaking of the incident Friday, Brevard County Sheriff Wayne Ivey said, “I’m going to try and use restraint as I tell you about this case.” He then called the perpetrators “disgusting” and “vile.”
Ivey said the healthcare workers were supposed to be caring for the woman at the local facility, noting the facility was unaware of the incident as it was happening.
However, the moment they learned about it they contacted authorities and fired the two workers. Ivey also showed the clip of the initial incident:
Officials arrested the first suspect, Jada Harris, 18, for video voyeurism, abuse and neglect of an elderly or disabled adult, along with interception or disclosure of wired communications.
The other suspect in the case, Shy’Tiona Bishop, 20, was arrested for video voyeurism and abuse and neglect of an elderly or disabled adult.
Journalist Fred Davenport described the suspects as nurse assistants:
Following the incident, the sheriff said the victim was placed safely with professional healthcare workers and her family members.
“As you might imagine, I’m pretty ticked off about this as you can tell… but this kind of crap just drives me insane,” Ivey explained, noting he met his team while they escorted the suspects to an official vehicle.
“The irony of this is that our corrections team, professionals that they are, will treat these two pieces of crap with professionalism and they’ll do their job. These two were supposed to be taking care of this lady and didn’t do their jobs,” the sheriff continued.
He added that “sadly” their bonds were set at $6,000 for Harris and $4,000 for Bishop. Ivey said if he were in charge of setting the bonds it would be “when hell freezes over.”
“I’ll be honest with you, I wouldn’t let them care for a pet cobra because he might accidentally bite them and he would die of scumbag poisoning,” Ivey concluded.
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) defines elder abuse as “an intentional act or failure to act that causes or creates a risk of harm to an older adult.”
“The abuse occurs at the hands of a caregiver or a person the elder trusts,” the agency said.